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The thing that would scare me the most would be something that could be believable and realistic. So if it was a zombie film, for me, it won't be scary. But if it was something paranormal or includes some sort poltergeist or demon. That'd be scary as hell.
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Quite. Zombie origins involving viruses/parasites (e.g. Resident Evil/28 Days Later) are far, far, FAR more believable than poltergeists and demonic possession. Look at toxoplasmosis, a parasite that affects the behaviour of rats so they're more likely to be caught/killed by the parasite's true "target", cats. There are many other examples of such viruses/fungi/parasites occurring in nature, that alter the behaviour of their host organisms. One other example is a fungus that infects caterpillars and causes them to climb to higher branches, out in the open before dying, so that the fungal spores will spread further and wider. Toxoplasmosis has also been linked to psychological disorders in humans, so it's not such a huge stretch to imagine a naturally occurring or genetically engineered parasite that makes humans act like Zombies.
On the other hand, poltergeists aren't real and nor is demonic possession except as a psychological disorder.
The problem with explaining such viruses/fungi/parasites in enough detail to educate the audience, and make it seem "real", is that it would negatively affect the pacing of the movie. That's why 28 Days Later, Resident Evil(s) & I Am Legend (cinematic cut at least IIRC) spend so little time dealing with the origin. I Am Legend & Resident Evil do use The Cure or the search for a Cure as plot points, but it's a fine line to tread.
Anyway, the true horror in good examples of either sub-genre usually comes from very similar places, i.e. sustained, escalating threats of violence toward the protagonist; sustained, escalating fear and despair in the protagonist; overwhelming odds. Saw, Hostel, Friday 13th etc (& to a certain extent the Scream franchise) rely purely on the power of The Kill and minor "twists", but mostly The Kill; the problem with that is that gore, evisceration and entrails will only get you so far; people quickly become inured to the violence. Psychological torment, disorientation, despair and mistrust stay with you much longer.
Also don't be afraid of a Bait & Switch from They Almost Got Away With It to a Bummer Ending. A lingering shot of a lone survivor with one bullet, mentally broken, surrounded by a horde of zombies. Cut to black.
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But with zombies, you're 80% in a "gore" type and 20% in a "jumper" type of scare, whereas ghosts will rather be 80% "psychological" and 20% "jumper".
Yep, I'm totally recycling my comment above (above if you're having the newest comments first, that is).
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Not neccessarily, there's a lot of mileage to be had from suspense, despair and psychological horror in zombie films, especially by using the human element, though it's not in evidence as much as gore and surprise. It's a non-zombie example, but in The Mist, there's the fear and horror that comes from the monsters outside and "the unknown", but even more terrifying are the other humans, turning on each other. That would work just as well in any survival/last-of-humanity situation.
Also, I think simplifying the zombie horror sub-genre and saying the "horror" comes from 80% gore and 20% surprise is disingenuous. It's far too complex a subject. Also, I assume we're talking about "horror" movies as opposed to "scary movies" here but gore and surprise don't make a horror movie, they make a scary movie. (All horror movies are scary movies but not all scary movies are horror movies).
I think true Horror comes from sustained/escalating threat/fear, emotional investment in characters etc.. Gore and surprise are just two methods of providing the scares, which certainly help, but don't completely develop the actual Horror of the characters' situation. Horror movies have to have some kind of emotional impact on the audience or else they're just pointless gore-fests like Saw or Hostel. In fact, compare 28 Days Later and Hostel to see why gore and shock fail against a little gore and a little shock coupled with emotional investment in characters, human tension, despair etc.
tl;dr, Successful Ghost Stories neccessarily rely more on psychological elements and suspense but there's no reason why a zombie/monster movie can't provide the same psychological torment while still utilising shock & gore.
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Well, the problem with zombie movies is that it's basically a small group of "us" against a horde of "them"... the tendency then is to have as much blood on screen as possible. I am pointing out again to the readers I am talking about movies that have been made.
28 Days Later I recall does have this "a small group of "us" against a small group of "them"", and that's when you can make the psychological type. But it remains hard with traditional zombies; isn't it in the mainstream culture now that this green mass stumbling to put a foot after the other only has the basic instinct of eating anything that moves?
I am Legend, the novel, had a great way of recycling zombies. The traditional ones never would have had an effect, even if everything in the novel had been kept as is.
When making a zombie movie, it's much harder to get out of the gore type than with a ghost movie. Then again, a ghost movie is "a small group of "them" against a big group of "us"". Why didn't anybody try this before?
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That horrible feeling you get when you think you've done something good, with the best intentions, only for it to fairly directly result in something terrible happening. That moment of sickening realisation that you've just irreparably lost something you care about incredibly deeply and that it is your fault. The sheer contrast between the hight of satisfaction and the crushing feeling of loss and despair makes being brought down to such negative emotion all the worse.
Not that something like that has actually happened to me. I just have an irritatingly vivid imagination that enjoys torturing me on occasion.
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I don't really know what to recommend, but most of his stories are public domain if you want to check some of it out.
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Ive put the re-animator down in my to watch list and now dagon will join it, have also bookmarked the colour out of space by lovecraft which i read on another forum that its supposed to be good
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If you can't handle it, don't watch it. If you can, it's an interesting film to discuss specially if you are very sensible or critical about movies.
However, it's still the most disturbing thing I've ever seen and I'm never seeing it again.
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Defiantly. Like the Hannibal movies. They are exceptional (yet twisted) stories.
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Watch the cut version, it leaves most of the disturbing footage out while leaving the plot intact. Also, it's really well acted and shot (It looks like a Cronenberg film).
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What scares me most is when a character that I actually care about is in danger of being killed. Most horror films seem to go out of their way to create twats so damn unlikeable I start rooting for the serial killer instead.
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Being surprise scared always helps the feel. Especially if the dark room effect kicks in, where every corner and shadowed area of your room might be hiding one of those scares after watching the film :)
Best effective horror films leave you feeling watched when you go to sleep :P
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The best horror is when there's nothing there. Don't show the monster except for tiny, split-second flashes at best.
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Another option is to make the audience realize that they've seen the culprit clearly, but it's never revealed who it is? Cluedo scenario, like in "Black Christmas".
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PROMETHEUS just in case you haven't seen this new trailer yet. Isn't it amazing?
Yeah, what about inspiration from Alien? But sci-fi could be difficult on a tight budget :D
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Just to warn you, it's quite disturbing. It's a film you probably won't forget for awhile afterwards.
But I'd definitely recommend it to a horror film fan, like yourself. And PLEASE watch it to the end.
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i think sudden flickers scare me the most. like when a character is walking slowly towards the screen and then suddenly flickers super close to the camera for a second only to go back to where they were before. or when the scene is something completely calm only to flicker to something completely terrifying and then flickers back to being calm and normal. i think the shining does that really well!
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Best scare? When there is strictly nothing there. It makes for an awesome twist too.
You've got three types of "scares" in movies:
The gore: throw in as much guts and blood as you can. Doesn't matter if your body holds 100 gallons of blood, it's TV! This isn't very scary, unless you start playing with the idea, such as SAW does. Seeing someone mutilating themselves or eating human organs is plain disgusting, and that's what the premise plays on.
The jumper: that's when you've got a character turn around and... the monster's here! OMG! This effect is not really dread or fear, it's more of an adrenalin rush. If you ask me, a masterpiece wouldn't need jumpers.
The psychological: fear, in essence, is not knowing what's going to happen at all combined with thinking the worst is what's happening. On screen, the psychological fear can be done by working on the viewer rather than the characters. For example, you could turn one of the good guys who's chasing the serial killer into a bad guy who ends up working with the serial killer. Of course, this doesn't sound very scary. You want to make the viewer feel uneasy too, and you'll need to play on instincts - darkness, anomalies (having red eyes glow in the dark for example), strange sounds... Coming back to our scene, you could show Good Guy participating in a ritual with Bad Guy, and for some reason GG is clenching a trash bag in his hand. Obviously, the ritual is in the dead of night only lit with a single candle. Then, there's a noise and they both look at it. Finally, BD reaches in the bag and pulls out a human head and spine. Bang.
Moreover, I think a good scary movie should work on the viewer and not the characters. There's a movie on Youtube and it's simply a girl getting up in the night to answer the phone. Nobody is at the end of the line, and so she goes back to bed. Turns out there's a bulge like someone is sleeping in her bed. The camera switches to the other side, and so we see the demon-like figure hiding in the sheets AND the woman reaching in, but she doesn't see it. It's perfect (after that it's a typical jumper). But if you want to go even deeper, remove the jumper entirely.
Then, there's various mistakes horror movies make:
the lobotomized: we all know this character. It's the one who could lose an argument with a clam. She (it's usually a she) runs around, she screams a lot, and she doesn't know what she's doing there.
the plot: most horror movies overlook this one entirely. The thinking is "people just want gore and stuff". A good plot however can take the viewer's mind off of the general scariness of the movie, just in time for them to be horrifically reminded of what they're watching.
the documentary: that might just be personal, but the fake documentary type was pretty much covered with Blair Witch. Having First-person scenes however may just work out great.
... And there's stuff they do good:
The music: the musical score works perfectly. If you're scared when watching something, just turn off the volume.
The protagonists: the viewer must really feel a link with the protagonist. While I recommend you try to work on the person behind the screen instead of the characters, there should be a feeling of hopelessness built around a believable person. Having your protagonist fight against a much more powerful force also helps the viewer root for him. Cracked has various articles on movies, you should check them out.
Anyway, if you need more help on this project, just add me on Steam. I don't bite and I don't ask for anything. Or barely anything. cough.
And if you guys liked this comment, you might like my website (head on over to my Steam profile).
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Being a music lover, I feel audio is very important in a horror film as well. A good, haunting piano line OR sharp, crawling strings (ex: Psycho) is wonderful.
But also, in horror, silence is a gift. If we lose one of our senses, we as viewers, lose cues to prepare us for that chainsaw-wielding maniac. We feel less in control, and so we get more scared. Can also apply to blank screen, with terrifying audio running in the background.
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Hmm, your point about the Youtube video with the girl reminds me of a quote I heard somewhere.
The gist of it was that showing the audience something that the characters do not see, say for example, a bomb under someone's desk that they don't notice, is the essence of suspense. You are just going to be waiting for the bomb to go off, but you don't know when, or if the character at the desk will move away in time. Hell, you could make an entire short film out of just that premise, following a normal guy's boring office day, but contrasting it every so often with the ever present threat of the bomb and keeping the suspense up right to the end, when the guy goes to leave and the bomb goes off.
Actually that's probably a terrible idea, never listen to a tired Moos film ideas at 2:30AM...
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Nope, it's a great idea. What if there never was any bomb?
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Extremely helpful sir! I will go over some of this with my partner and I'll be sure to contact you if we come across any problems. Also, where abouts do you live because I'm hoping to get a premiere in an independent cinema in Brighton, England that I would be more than happy to see anyone from this site come down
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Unfortunately, I live in Switzerland and England is a bit too far. But in any case, just add me anytime and we can look things over.
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BRIGHTON!! I live less than an hour's drive away.
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Yes, I know Duke Of York's Picturehouse. Oldest cinema in Britain.
I went there for a Halloween John Carpenter all-nighter last year. I immediately liked the cinema, when I realised they specialized in showing arty films, indie films, cult classics etc. To be honest, I could see myself working there. :D
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Something I've noticed happen A LOT in vampire or zombie movies.. The people don't seem to know what vampires or zombies are. Like in that fictional universe that's been created, vampires and zombies were never thought up of until the radioactive container created them. It's annoying! Making the characters relatable is important. Creating an insane distinction like that just separates the emotion further.
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You should check this films:
Paranormal Activity 3 (The first 2 are horrible but this one is actually good),
Insidious,
The Haunting,
The Changeling,
Alice Sweet Alice,
Noroi: The Curse,
Marebito,
Ringu,
The Ring,
Kairo,
Alien,
Contamination (An italian alien rip-off that's actually pretty cool and atmospheric. Plus, it haves a soundtrack composed by Goblin, the guys that did the music for Deep Red, Suspiria, Dawn Of The Dead, etc.),
The Descent,
The Tenant,
Rosemary's Baby,
The Exorcist,
Exorcist III: Legion,
Saw III,
Tenebre,
The Beyond,
Suspiria,
Deep Red,
Opera,
Martyrs,
Cannibal Holocaust,
Night Train Murders (A rip-off of The Last House Of The Dead, only better acted and without comedy),
Blood And Black Lace,
Black Sunday,
The House By The Cemetary,
Dawn Of The Dead,
Day Of The Dead,
Night Of The Living Dead,
Martin,
Zombi 2,
Maniac,
The Legend Of Hell House,
Audition,
Funny Games.
Those are some of my favorites.
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LOL
You've reminded me of a slasher film called "The Tripper", I thought it was decent. You might like it.
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The best horror is the one which messes with your mind. The one which makes you feel watched. The one which makes you unconfortable in the places you usually are (in the living room, in the bedroom, etc). Monsters, zombies, aliens, these things are ridiculous and used to scare kids. Ghosts, spirits, demons? That's to scare teens. If you really want to make someone cry of fear, you don't have to go to the fiction to get it, all you have to do is to show what, in my case, is the most horrible monster ever, the human being itself.
We kill eachother, we try to be better than the others, we wage war against the others for nothing, we murder, we rape, that's creepy, that's horrible, not monsters that kill for a story to be there. Psychos, maniacs, that's what I fear the most, knowing that by any time a guy with a mask and a baseball bat can jump through my window while I chat with my friends on the internet, and then being beaten to death is just as horrible as nothing.
If you really want to shock someone, you just have to make them face the reality.
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Jaws still scares me. It's the "not seeing what is beneath". And the haunting theme, of course. Still a classic.
Also Alien, because it is something so different/unknown.
One scene, that is still freaking me out when I see references to it, is the ending of Bodysnatchers (the one with Donald Sutherland). The whole movie is about not realizing what lies beneath the surface. Everything seems normal, but it's not. And when you see the maincharacter in the last scene shortly before he screams, the feeling of uncertainty comes up. Very spine-chilling.
Since you want to make a movie, I can also recommend Nosferatu and M that use shadows in a really creepy way on screen. I don't know why, but something about the scene with Nosferatu on the boat or walking the city is very creepy. In M it is just the use of what you see and what that little child does not see. There is a scene with a girl bouncing a ball against an advertising pillar (on which a wanted poster about a child killer is) and you only see the shadow of some guy going over this pillar saying "You have a beautifull ball. What's your name"... brrrr...
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There's a lot to learn from Nosferatu. It was originally meant as a cheap knock-off of Dracula to cash in on the vampire fad, but the French cinema industry didn't have a tenth of the funds Americans had, and yet they pulled it off.
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Hmm, so it is. My history teachers were all wrong :P
I also learned that Nosferatu is in fact the adaptation of Dracula, but they didn't have the rights so they changed a name here and there.
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There have been few movies that have made me shiver scared. There's a certain scene in Paranormal Activity when you can see a shadow slowly creeping over the teenage daughter's body. The bass kicks up in otherwise silence, and you know something's going on until she wakes up. I remember seeing the new Amityville Horror movie when I was a bit younger and thought it was pretty creepy. Certain scenes in the new The Thing movie made me shudder. Knowing that a single touch from this thing could do you in and watching it happen to people. I don't know if it was the crowd adding to it, but the Fourth Kind had some pretty scary parts to it, too.
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Have pretty much to say, but I'd gladly turn this conversation in personal with some beer and live chatting. Topping the stuff mentioned here I'd like to recommend "Hills have eyes". It's pretty familiar to "Texas Chaisaw Massacre" by the plot, but is completely different because of... Won't say anything more for not to spoil the movie. Also, if you are looking for something scary I would speak of Silent Hill. Not that shitty movie. Not those last games. The very early Silent Hill. I've watched lots and lots of horror movies, played lots of horror games. But Silent Hill itself scared the crap out of me. Not mostly because of the "Boo" effects, no. The suspence, the symbolizm, the sounds. Also, there have been some games of the SCP series released lately which can easily make you shit bricks on your first run: SCP - 087 - B and SCP - Containment Breach. Hope this will help anyhow.
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Are you talking about the original or the remake of Hills? I haven't seen either, but I know that the plot varies dramatically in some ways.
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:D I just knew SCP-087-B was coming in this thread. It is scary. I was playing in the middle of the day with the curtains wide open, bright sunlight, and it still made me very, very nervous XD
One day, i hope to play Silent Hill and Resident Evil originals.
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Making a horror film and been watching a shit load of movies recently for some ideas when I thought SG will help me! What scares you the most? Will be sure to share the film with you guys when it's done (may take a few months), thanks :)
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